Judge Orders Bitcoin Wallet Returned to Murder Convict’s Family

In a Tuesday ruling, Justice John Bodurtha of the Nova Scotia Supreme Court ordered the return of a laptop containing a Bitcoin wallet to William Sandeson’s family. Global News reported that he found prosecutors had not proved the cryptocurrency was linked to Sandeson’s 2015 murder of Dalhousie University student Taylor Samson.

“The Crown has not met its burden to demonstrate the cryptocurrency was used as part of the drug transaction, proceeds of crime, or otherwise tainted by criminality,” Bodurtha said. He added that the cryptocurrency’s potential use in the deal was “hypothetical.”

What did the court decide about the wallet?

Sandeson appeared virtually at the hearing in Halifax. He filed a motion in April seeking return of personal items seized when police searched his apartment after his arrest in 2015. The order grants his request for the laptop, while the cash ruling separates alleged criminal proceeds from property the Crown failed to link to criminality.

Bodurtha separately classified about US$3,600 (C$5,000) in cash found in the apartment as “offence-related property.” That money will not be returned to Sandeson. The result returns the laptop and wallet from the same search but denies the return of the cash.

The decision turns on evidentiary proof rather than the wallet’s value. The judge found the Crown had not demonstrated a link to the drug transaction, proceeds of crime or other criminality; the family’s civil case remains a separate proceeding.

How much was the Bitcoin worth?

Sandeson said the Bitcoin was worth between about US$5,800 and US$7,200, or C$8,000 to C$10,000. A lawyer representing Samson’s family in a separate wrongful-death lawsuit, which had placed the cryptocurrency at its center, said it could now be worth more than US$144,000 (C$200,000).

Global News did not report how much Bitcoin the wallet holds, and the court order does not supply a coin count. Any accounting of the recovered asset must therefore start with the wallet’s actual contents rather than those public estimates.

What happened in the 2015 killing?

Sandeson, 23 at the time, had been about to start medical school at Dalhousie. He arranged for Samson, 22, to visit his apartment on August 15, 2015, to sell him cannabis that Sandeson had arranged to buy for C$40,000, prosecutors said at his 2023 trial.

Sandeson shot Samson, kept both the drugs and money, and later admitted dumping the body in a river that feeds the Bay of Fundy. Samson’s remains have never been found.

Sandeson was convicted of first-degree murder in 2017, but an appeals court overturned the verdict in 2020. At his second trial in 2023, he admitted shooting Samson and claimed he acted in self-defense. A jury found him guilty of second-degree murder, an offense carrying an automatic life sentence.

He is serving that sentence in Quebec and is eligible for parole in 2030.

What remains unresolved?

The criminal ruling does not resolve the family’s wrongful-death claim. Returning the laptop gives the family physical control of the wallet, but any unresolved monetary claim over the cryptocurrency remains tied to that separate suit rather than the criminal property ruling.

The report gave no deadline for the wallet handover; the next fixed date disclosed is Sandeson’s 2030 parole eligibility, while any unresolved claim over the Bitcoin remains tied to the family’s separate wrongful-death lawsuit.